Sunday, November 22, 2009

Rediscovering the Old Ways

We moved into our first house at the end of August and have ever since been looking for various things temporarily lost in the pile of boxes in our spare bedroom. Today's quest was for my family recipe book; the holiday season is upon us and there are just certain things that MUST be cooked, to honor family traditions as well as fulfill the anticipations of much awaited gastric delights.

Thanks to a wonderful computer program called Delicious Library, we knew it was probably in Book Box 18 with our other recipe books, so all we had to do is find said Book Box 18 among the 40 other boxes in the room. This wasn't as difficult as you might imagine thanks to some semblance of order in the way we had put the boxes in the room during an earlier organizing moment. Success was nearly immediate, and therein lay the problem. Mentally I had set aside, oh, an hour, to find the family recipe book. Success 10 minutes into the project meant that I was left with the feeling that I still had at least 50 minutes to "play" amongst the boxes.

This is a slippery slope, of course. First you just think that you'll peek into "Mystery Box of Crap from Howell" (yes, this is how I labeled some re-discovered boxes that never got unpacked after our move to TN 4.5 years ago), and then you start digging to see what's in the depths of the box, and the next thing you know, you've found random "treasures" and you're moving furniture around in the other rooms of the house to find places for your new treasures. And then your Sunday afternoon is completely gone and your house is a mess and you wonder how you got to this place when all you'd been doing was looking for one cookbook.

One of the treasures I just had to claim from the depths of the mystery box was an old wooden container of letters and visiting cards. I think I got this box from Les's Grandma Rollins' estate after she died, but I don't think I've ever really looked through it. Today was the day (but of course!). I lifted out each visiting card, most only containing a person's name written in lovely script, though a few had crazy tasseled borders or were tucked within a decorative, four-color paper card. There were a number of baby announcements, wedding invitations, and graduation invites, most very simple and all (surprisingly) confirming that we really haven't made any progress in invitation/announcement design in the past 100 years. I discovered a few Easter or Valentine's Day cards, though nothing was written on them, as if they were purchased to send and then never mailed.

My favorite piece in the box, however, is a dance invitation, simply because it provides a lovely snap-shot of life in 1907. I don't have my scanner hooked up, but it's quite a simple design, so I'll just type it up "as is" to give you an idea of what you might have gotten up to on a Monday night over 100 years ago.

Seventh Grand Dancing Party
will be given at Niedermeier's Hall, Newport, Michigan, on
Monday evening, February eleventh
nineteen seven
The presence of yourself and friends will add to
the pleasures of the occasion
Music by Finzel's Orchestra of Detroit
Music begins at eight thirty o'clock
Niedermeier Brothers
Admission 75 cents
Oyster Supper 25 cents
Special car leaves Newport for Rockwood at 12:30 and for Monroe at 1:00 o'clock

Imagine being out until 1 a.m. on a Monday night in February! Don't let anyone tell you they weren't living large back in aught-seven!